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The Calgary Stampede has long been a part of Calgary history. In recognition of this year’s event, for 10 days a week (July 4-15), we’re sharing featured stock photos and event highlights from the first 10 decades of the world’s greatest outdoor extravaganza. This installment: The stampede in the 1920s.
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And they are off! Chariot racing was added as a new event at the Calgary Stampede in 1923. This photo was taken between 1925 and 1929. Glenbow Archives Photo PA-3809-4.Glenbow Archives
1921-22: Calgary Industrial Exhibition Co. organized a winter carnival. It featured snowshoeing, hockey and ski jumping for which a 22.5 meter tower was installed built on the roof of the Tribune.
1923: The Exposition and the Stampede merged to become a single annual event. The Stampede was held in July for the first time and still is. Chuckwagon races have been added as a new Stampede event. The downtown stores were motivated to decorate western, and prizes were awarded for the best Western dress. The western spirit spilled into the streets of Calgary. The first pancake breakfasts were served downtown in 1923. The Prince of Wales held a special award ceremony at his EP Ranch for riding broncos. champion Pete Vandermeer.
1925: Universal Pictures released The Calgary Stampede, an American box office hit starring Hoot Gibson. Guy Weadick played a prominent role.
1926: Fire Chief James (Cappy) Intelligent led the Stampede parade on an elephant.
1926: The British band Coldstream Guards played. Dick Cosgrave won his first chuckwagon trophy, a feat he would repeat nine times over the next 17 years.
— Timeline compiled by Karen Crosby, Norma Marr, and Aimee Benoit.
July 1923 – The first roots of Stampede pancake breakfasts began. Here, Horace Inkster serves pancakes at a Calgary Stampede street breakfast, from Jack Morton’s wagon. Inkster was a cook at Morton’s CX Ranch. Glenbow Archives Photo NA-4006-8. A photo of a car from 1924. Photo from the Calgary Stampede Archives. Ralph “Slim” Moorehouse leads a team of 36 horses pulling 10 grain cars to Calgary in 1925. Moorehouse worked for Glen House, owner of ON Ranch in the Arrowwood region southeast of Calgary. He would bring the team, said to be the longest in the world, to be part of the Stampede parade. The outfit created quite a stir and numerous photographers snapped pictures of the team as they walked across the prairie towards Calgary. Among them was Calgary’s McDermid Photo Laboratories, which turned this scene into postcards. Farmhand WR Park purchased this postcard at Stampede the following year and mailed it from Delia, Alberta, to his employers, the Pomeroy family, in Gilroy, Sask. Calgary Herald Archives; photo courtesy of Bernice Pomeroy. Ralph Arrison is shown with his best horse, a mare named Fanny. In July 1925, when Arrison was 12, he rode Fanny from Bassano to the Calgary Stampede to catch up with the longest team of horses in the world. Calgary Herald Archives; photo originally provided by Ralph Arrison. Slim Fry rides a bronco in the 1926 Calgary Stampede. Photo from the Calgary Herald archives. July 9, 1923: The Herald’s comic supplement family comes to town for the big Stampede. Herald cartoonist WG Guthrie has caught Jiggs and Maggie in a moment of true marital bliss, behind the wheel of a car bound for the Stampede, while Andy Gump and Min have forgotten about the troublesome Babe and are ready to spend the money. last $500 from the Gump family’s mysterious benefactor. Even Mr. and Mrs. have forgotten their weekly argument and have absorbed the spirit of Stampede. And naturally, the Regular Fellers are there, clinging to the stirrup. Calgary Herald Archives. 1926 and 1927 Stampede Pins in a collection owned by Eileen and Les Lehr. Calgary Herald Archives. This is a stampede stained award tag from the 1923 Stampede, which was the first year the Stampede and Exhibit were merged. Second prize was won by Mrs. PC Shackleton. The tag was donated by her grandson and is part of the Calgary Stampede archives. Photo from the Calgary Herald files. 1923 Official Stampede Program. Photo from the Calgary Herald files.
